By Jake Coyle, Film Writer
NEW YORK (AP) --The 61st New York Film Festival will kick off with Todd Haynes' "May December," a juicy drama starring Natalie Portman as an actor preparing for a film about a years-ago tabloid scandal.
Film at Lincoln Center, which puts on the New York Film Festival, announced Tuesday that "May December" — one of the standouts at this year's Cannes Film Festival — will be the opening night film at this year's edition. The gala will take place Sept. 29 at Alice Tully Hall.
In it, Portman plays a well-known TV star who, to research a role, spends time with Gracie (Julianne Moore) and her much-younger husband, Joe (Charles Melton). They're a seemingly happy suburban family whose initial affair 20 years earlier, when Joe was 13, was a national story. Their backstory is loosely based on the case of Mary Kay Letourneau, a Washington State schoolteacher convicted of raping her sixth-grade student, Vili Fualaau. They later married.
"'May December' is a tour de force of writing, acting, and directing: a film built on moment-to-moment surprise, as thought-provoking as it is purely pleasurable," said Dennis Lim, the festival's artistic director, in a statement. "It cements Todd Haynes's place as one of American cinema's most brilliant mischief-makers and as an all-time great director of actors."
Following its Cannes premiere, Netflix acquired "May December" and will release it in theaters Nov. 17 and on the streaming platform Dec. 1. The NYFF launch will return Haynes to a festival he's regularly attended over the years. His "Velvet Goldmine," "I'm Not There," "Carol," "Wonderstruck" and "The Velvet Underground" have all previously played at the festival.
"It is a festival that plays a role in my work and life like no other in the world, since it enshrines the cultural life of this city, which is both my creative home as a filmmaker and, as ever, the eternal site of artistic possibility," Haynes said in a statement.
The New York Film Festival runs Sept. 29—Oct. 15.
SCHROM x Yacht Club and Be Electric Studios Launch Electric XR for Virtual Production
SCHROM x Yacht Club, a full-service live-action, tabletop, and postproduction company, has teamed with Be Electric Studios, a soundstage, equipment rental, and virtual production company, to launch Electric XR, a virtual production collective.
Industry veteran Thomas Rossano will lead the new venture, which provides advanced virtual production solutions across multiple facilities. He brings over 25 years of experience in live-action, tabletop, postproduction and talent curation to enhance Electric XR’s offerings as a resource for brands and agencies, as well as other production companies in need of virtual production solutions. Additionally Rossano continues to serve as EP at XR New York (XR-NY), a role he’s held since December 2022. SCHROM x Yacht Club originally established XR-NY to help provide XR services for third-party rentals. While XR-NY will continue to function independently for SCHROM X Yacht Club, it now operates under the Electric XR umbrella.
Rossano’s expertise spans producing live-action commercials, branded content, interactive and experiential content. In addition to leading Electric XR, he holds responsibilities at SCHROM x Yacht Club which include driving business development, collaborating with sales reps and expanding the company’s creative talent network. Rossano’s career includes serving as an exec producer at Hungry Man for about 11 years, right from that company’s inception. He then went on to become a partner at Station Film where he also had a lengthy tenure. Later he was a partner at PRISM. Then after the pandemic hit, he became a freelance EP for nearly two years, looking into opportunities in virtual production, which led him to XR NY and now Electric XR. Over the years, he has produced high-profile... Read More